Three Metro-Dade auto-theft detectives were shot to death on Miami Beach on Thursday, April 1, 1976, by the driver of a stolen car. The three slain officers were Frank D'Azevedo, 31, Thomas Hodges, 32, and Clark Curlette, 29. The killer committed suicide by shooting himself shortly before his capture and died the next day.
The three officers had received a tip that three employees of the FL Motor Vehicle Bureau were selling fake licenses out of the Miami Beach license station. They passed the tip along to the FL Highway Patrol and when FHP decided to arrest the three employees as part of a sting operation, the three officers were invited as a courtesy to attend the arrest at the Miami Beach license station at 8720 Collins Ave..
As the three officers stood outside the license station observing the FHP sting around 6:00PM, they noticed a light-colored Lincoln Mark IV with Illinois license plates cruise by. The officers, "who had an uncanny sixth sense about stolen cars," exchanged glances indicating that each thought that it might be stolen. (In February Det. D'Azevedo had been involved in the breakup of a major car-theft ring. Many of the stolen cars were new Lincoln Continental Mark IV's.) They watched the driver park the Lincoln behind the Beach Motel next door to the license station.
The three officers decided that they should check out the car. D'Azevedo remained at the driver's license station while Detectives Hodges and Curlette drove one block to the Beach Motel (also known as Starkey's Motel) at 8601 Harding Ave. The two non-uniformed officers, police badges clipped to their clothing, parked near the Mark IV on the grassy lot behind the U-shaped motel. The driver of the Mark IV was registered at the Beach Hotel as Joseph Mowlood (but later identified as Ronald Joseph Born, 41) and was in his ground-floor apartment (Room #5) on the northwest corner of the building. The detectives, who went to the hotel to make a "casual inquiry" of the owner of the Mark IV, had no way of knowing that the man they sought to question was a federal fugitive, had an irrational fear of imprisonment, and had vowed he would die before being arrested and taken back to jail again.
(However, Karen Hodges, the widow of Officer Thomas Hodges, recalled in 1995 that her husband called her earlier that night and told her they were going to serve a federal warrant and mentioned Born by name as the "target" of the warrant. Thus it may be that the officers recognized the Mark IV as possibly belonging to Born and went to the motel looking for him.) Motel manager Barry Starkey said Hodges and Curlette approached him and asked who owned the Mark IV in the parking lot. Starkey indicated that Mowlood owned the car and the officers asked him to go to Mowlood's room and tell him that they would like to talk with him about the car. Starkey went to Mowlood's room and told him that two policemen were there to ask him about his car. Mowlood called out that he would be out in a couple of minutes. After waiting a few minutes the two officers went to Mowlood's room.
According to Starkey, as the two officers were in the passageway approaching Mowlood's room (before they knocked), he fired a blast from his shotgun through the window at the officers. The officers were shot before they had a chance to identify themselves. However, Born must have believed they were police officers as it was his fear of arrest that apparently motivated him to open fire.
Curlette was hit by the blast in the chest and fell back against Hodges, knocking him to the ground. Curlette, seriously wounded, then ran out of the building shouting, "Police officer, police officer. I've been shot!" He kept shouting, about four or five times, and then he fell, and he still said it a couple of times when he was on the ground....and he gave a big shudder and he was still. (Miami News, 421976) Starkey said that within seconds Hodges got up and "went toward room number five. Then there was another blast and Hodges was hit in the face and shoulder and fell 30 feet back against the wall." Neither one of the policemen pulled their guns. When the policeman fell near me, his jacket flipped over and I saw the gun in his holster. I thought about taking it, and wondered what to do. (Miami News, 421976)
The manager fell to the grass and saw Joe Mowlood (Born) run out of the hotel and the third police officer (D'Azevedo) begin to chase him. The killer crossed Collins Ave. and Starkey then saw him turn around and point the shotgun at the pursuing officer. Joe aimed his shotgun and shot. I saw the cop drop down on one knee on the side of something, a parked car. The cop shouted something and then Joe took aim again and went boom, and that was it. (Miami News, 421976) D'Azevedo had arrived quickly as he was less than a block away at the driver's license station when he heard the shots that came from the hotel where he knew Hodges and Curlette were checking out the Mark IV. Upon hearing the gunfire D'Azevedo asked the troopers if they had weapons. Only one trooper was armed. Col. J.E. Beach of Tallahassee, the state commander of the Highway Patrol, was present at the scene as he had gone undercover to pose as a driver's license buyer and was standing, out of uniform and unarmed, with D'Azevedo. He said later that this was the first time he had been on duty without his weapon in his 20-year career.
D'Azevedo then saw a man whom he assumed to be the shooting suspect running across Collins Ave. toward the beach. D'Azevedo and the one armed trooper gave chase and D'Azevedo fired several shots at the fleeing gunman. It was during this chase that Born fired his 12-gauge shotgun at D'Azevedo, hitting him in the left shoulder and face. The officer was able to fire two shots with his snub-nose .38 caliber handgun at the fleeing gunman but apparently missed his target. Born fired the shotgun a second time, this time hitting D'Azevedo in the stomach and the officer fell to the sand mortally wounded. Even though dying, D'Azevedo spent his last words (before losing consciousness) describing his assailant to a passerby who came to his aid. He began the description with, "Remember this!" He was a cop to the end! Curlette died (at 6:15PM) in the parking lot where he had run and fallen after being shot by Born outside of Room #5. D'Azevedo and Hodges were rushed to St. Francis Hospital, one in a police car and one in a Miami Beach fire-rescue unit. "There were no regular ambulances because drivers and attendants at Randle Eastern Ambulance Service went on strike" after midnight the day before. One police officer described the frustration felt by those transporting the officer in the police car, "What can we do? We're cops, not doctors."
D'Azevedo was pronounced dead at 6:54PM at St. Francis shortly after arrival. Cause of death was two shotgun wounds to the back and chest. Hodges was pronounced dead at 7:02PM with the death certificate listing cause of death as "shotgun wound of face and upper chest."
The chaos at the scene was captured on video by WTVJ, Channel 4, which had been at the driver's license station location covering the arrests in that sting. Channel 4 cameramen rushed to the scene and filmed one of the wounded officers on the ground being aided by fellow officers before medical help arrived. They also filmed the wounded killer as he was taken away by the police.
Many citizens called the TV station to complain about the graphic coverage, stating that it offended them and violated the privacy of the wounded officer. Channel 4's longtime anchor, Ralph Renick, in a TV editorial, defended the airing of the footage as showing the reality of the dangers that police officers face but apologized for not warning viewers in advance of the graphic nature of the pictures.
Miami Beach officer Leo Weber was on patrol nearby and had seen Hodges and Curlette, with clipped on police badges, get out of their car. When he heard shooting he immediately radioed for help. Scores of officers then emerged on the scene. In the initial confusion police believed more than one gunman was involved and thus began searching for other suspects.
Miami Beach officer Robert Acuna and other officers swept southward along the beach. It was now about 6:30PM. The officers heard one shot from a clump of dense palms and seagrapes about 100 yards south of 87th St. The officers slowly approached the overgrown area. Officer Acuna jumped into the bushes and saw the suspect in front of him. Born had the revolver in one hand and the shotgun lying near him but appeared to be gravely wounded from a self-inflicted gunshot (with the .38 caliber handgun) wound to the head.
The wounded suspect didn't say a word to the approaching officer but simply turned over on his stomach. Born was then "half-carried and half-dragged" out of the undergrowth and arrested. He was taken to North Miami General Hospital where he died the next day (April 2) at 8:47AM.
Still thinking that other suspects were involved, the police set up a command post at 87th St. and Collins Ave. and sealed off the island city. Police dogs and helicopters searched for a second suspect as night fell. The search was called off when further investigation proved that there was only one assailant.
The Metro-Dade Police Department's auto theft office only had seven sworn officers and in one day it had lost three of the seven. The four remaining officers were Sam Guthas, Frank Melvin, Boyd Gans and Brian Price.
